I have been writing about the intersection of science and ambition for over 20 years. I am currently the Editor in Chief at Sandisk (disclosure: I write about computing architectures, but am rigorous about avoiding conflicts of interest.It's my promise to you.). I've also worked at Eastwick Communications, Greentech Media, CNET and CMP. My work has also been published in Forbes, the New York Times, National Geographic, Wired and other places and I speak somewhat regularly at conferences. I've visited the Orkney Islands to study wave power, filtered through reams of SEC documents, quizzed Elon Musk about EVs, and volunteered twice to be electrocuted. All for the sake of entertaining readers. One summer, I also gave out coupons for free nickels at a casino in Reno.

Will Japan Be The Big Story In Solar In 2012?

Quaheed Motiwala, managing director at DFJ JAIC Venture Partners, has travel advice for anyone going to Japan in the near future.

Bring a towel.

Japan has shut down 52 of its 54 nuclear reactors for maintenance and safety checks in wake of the Fukushima disaster, reducing the country’s power production by close to 30 percent. The remaining two reactors will shut in the spring.

As a result, many things powered by electricity are running only occasionally or not at all. Escalators are halted. Fewer neon lights burn in the Shinjuku district.

And the ubiquitous electric hand dryers in public restrooms are in deep sleep. Paper towels, because the pulp needs to be imported, aren’t universal.

So if you don’t have a towel, you either have to wipe your hands on your suit or give someone the cold fish, he told an audience during a panel on Japan’s energy future sponsored by Agrion last week. (I moderated.)

Although some reactors will likely come back online, many are already nearly 40 years old, meaning they won’t return. Public skepticism about the nuclear mafia that has also begun to grow, noted Zen Kishimoto of AltaTerra Research.

What can a country do that needs a quick surge of power capacity? Invest in efficiency is typically the first step. But Japan is already one of the more efficient nations when it comes to energy use in the world?

Fuel cells? Panasonic and Osaka Gas have been deploying fuel cells in homes for the last few years. Consumers can qualify for subsidies and gas companies love them.

That leaves solar. Although critics complain that photovoltaic panels cost more than regular power, solar has the advantage in speed. You can put solar on a house in a few days. Japan also still remains—despite losing ground to the U.S. and China—one of the leaders in panel production. Solar panels don’t generate power at night, but Japan also remains a leader in lithium ion batteries. Buying local is still a big deal, and local manufacturers love serving the local market, often to a fault.

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Very interesting commentary on your solar projections. US is still scheduling in Nuke Projects. In my opinion, no one should be adding anymore nuclear reator projects until there is a sound solution to nuclear waste disposal. I am probably in the dark ages, but I have not heard of a good solution yet. What have I missed? I am listening….

Not close to being true. An onshore wind turbine can be erected in days. Even offshore wind farms which are far more time-consuming to deploy only take months. For example, the Walney 2 offshore wind farm in the Irish Sea took just 8 months from start to finish.

LOL! yeah, maybe 120 or 150 or 180 days, for a not-so-big one. UNless of course, you plan on having a thousand construction workers on the site … not getting in each other’s way … & dozens of very expensive, rather rare cranes.

I can only laugh at this line in the greentech piece: “a surprising amount of open land and fallow farmland actually exists in Japan”. LOL, having spent a lot of time in Japan, having traveled extensively in Japan, I can say that only someone who hates “open land” or “green space” could say that.

The person who wrote that is the type who passes thru a country on a train thinking “hey, there’s a piece of land nobody is USING! Let’s put something ugly on it.”

otoh, I’m sure there is a lot of newly unused land in Fukushima Prefecture.